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The high-flying California lawyer accused of stealing millions from investors and gambling it away in Las Vegas has pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering charges.
As The Daily Beast reported, Sara Jacqueline King lived like a celebrity at the Wynn Las Vegas and was married to a descendant of Iranian royalty when she promoted her purported short-term loan business, King Family Lending, which she claimed floated cash to professional athletes, celebrities, and other wealthy borrowers.
King’s scheme was exposed after a British Virgin Islands company—owned by a longtime friend of her now second ex-husband Kamran Pahlavi—filed a civil suit against her this year. The company claimed it invested more than $10 million in her loan outlet throughout 2022 but received nothing in return.
Instead, the lawsuit claims, King used the investment to “to gamble in Las Vegas” and “fund an extravagant lifestyle.”
In interviews with The Daily Beast, friends of King also claimed that she scammed them out of thousands of dollars, even taking one couple’s life savings.
Such accusations quickly caught the attention of the feds.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California announced that it had reached a plea agreement with King, who is scheduled to appear in court next week. King’s guilty plea arrived at the same time the case was filed on the docket.
In a charging document filed Monday, federal prosecutors said King defrauded five investors out of more than $8 million between January 2022 and January 2023.
The legal filing states that King sought funding for short-term loans which she promised to repay plus interest. The lawyer assured her investors that if one of her high-net-worth borrowers defaulted, she’d sell off their collateral—which she claimed included yachts, luxury cars, watches, and professional sports contracts. “In reality, during this time period, defendant King never initiated nor funded any loan,” the document states.
Prosecutors allege that in addition to bankrolling her casino jaunts, King withdrew $132,156 from her firm’s bank account to buy a Porsche Taycan.
The plea agreement states that King faces a maximum of 30 years behind bars and a three-year period of supervised release. King would also be required to pay “a fine of $500,000 or twice the gross gain or gross loss resulting from the offenses, whichever is greatest.”
Under the deal, King agreed to pay restitution to her victims, including those who aren’t connected to her offenses listed in the guilty plea.
“The parties currently believe that the applicable amount of restitution is approximately $8,785,045, but recognize and agree that this amount could change based on facts that come to the attention of the parties prior to sentencing,” the plea agreement states.
In February, a former assistant to the alleged conwoman told The Daily Beast that she initially thought she was just working for a “a crazy rich lawyer.”
“She has no empathy for anybody,” Maire Casillas Berger said. “She doesn’t care who she hurts or what happens in the process, as long as she has her Saint Laurent clothing and her money to gamble.”
Ronald Richards, who represented the British Virgin Islands company and advocated on behalf of her victims, told The Daily Beast on Tuesday, “I’m grateful that Ms. King has accepted responsibility and is doing the right thing.”
“Even though no one is rooting for anyone to go to jail, I think the victims are happy there is some justice for what happened to them,” he said, adding that the civil suit he filed and ensuing publicity prevented King from defrauding even more people. “At least the public is protected.”